


Past Touch and Sight and Sound

by Ruby_Rubisco



Category: Inspector Morse (TV)
Genre: Canonical Character Death, Episode: s08e05 The Remorseful Day, Grief/Mourning
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-02
Updated: 2019-04-02
Packaged: 2020-01-01 05:54:04
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 885
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18329945
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ruby_Rubisco/pseuds/Ruby_Rubisco
Summary: He stumbles to a halt, catching himself on the fence, and there’s a vice closing around his chest as he struggles to breathe, and he can’t hear anything over the pounding of blood in his ears.The final few scenes from The Remorseful Day, from Robbie's perspective.





	Past Touch and Sight and Sound

Robbie’s phone rings as he’s getting out of his car at the airport.

“Lewis, it’s – ” but Chief Superintendent Strange is drowned out by a plane.

“You’ll have to shout, sir!”

“Morse had another heart attack, Lewis. They couldn’t get him back. He’s gone.”

Time slows as the fact trickles like ice water through his mind. Morse is… gone? He’s _dead_?

What will Oxford do without Inspector Morse? Not just Oxford, what will the world do?

What will _he_ do?

He stumbles to a halt, catching himself on the fence, and there’s a vice closing around his chest as he struggles to breathe, and he can’t hear anything over the pounding of blood in his ears. _Nononononono_. Not Morse. Not his guvnor. His mentor. His friend.

A plane roars overhead.

The airport. To arrest a murderer. That’s his job. That’s why he left the hospital. That’s why he wasn’t there, when…

He closes his eyes, manages to take a breath.

Strange’s voice is still issuing, tinny, from the phone held loosely in his hand. Robbie doesn’t try to catch the words.

“I’ve got to go, sir, to deal with Dr Harrison,” he says, and hangs up without waiting for an answer.

* * *

She confesses, which makes things simpler.

Not that Robbie cares much right now.

She tries to explain why, and Robbie _really_ doesn’t care about that. She killed someone, her own mother, no less, which led to three other murders, and a whole mess of loss and grief and _god_ , why would anyone want more death in this cold world?

He stands impassively next to her as they wait for a response car to take her to the station, as she talks, and he’s putting everything he’s got into holding it together until she’s out of his custody. And then she says, _dares_ to say, that Morse would understand why she beat someone’s skull in.

“Inspector Morse is dead!” he cries, over the sound of another plane.

Saying it out loud is another gut-punch, almost as bad as hearing from Strange, because it confirms that his world has got worse, irrevocably, forever, because he’s lost one of the best men he’ll ever know, and the _idea_ that his Inspector would sympathise with a brutal murderer is too much to let go.

She doesn’t talk much more after that, and he hands her over to a pair of uniformed officers when they arrive.

* * *

Strange is sitting in a blank hospital corridor, holding a plastic cup of something brown. He stands up when he sees Robbie, looking pale and drawn.

Neither of them speaks for a long moment.

“Dr Harrison?”

“On her way to the station.”

“Right. Well done, Lewis.”

Robbie stares at the floor. It was Morse who figured it out, not him. Morse should be the one getting praise.

Morse should be alive.

He thinks, distantly, that he really should have been more prepared; but despite every sign, despite that tight coil of worry and fear Robbie’s had building in his belly since Morse’s deterioration began 18 months ago, underneath it all, he never really believed it would happen. Morse might retire, but not die. He would always just be a phone call away, if Robbie needed him.

That’s something Robbie’s always taken for granted, that he’ll have Morse around when he makes Inspector. _There’ll an Inspector position open now_ , a harsh, bitter voice whispers in his head, and his eyes begin to burn. He shuts them against the raw injustice that _this_ is how he gets there. This is the price he has to pay. Would never have paid, if he’d had the choice.

“He, um,” Strange begins, “he wanted me to thank you.”

Robbie gazes at him blankly.

“Me, sir?”

Strange nods. “Those were his last words. “Thank Lewis for me.” He was very proud of you, you know.”

Robbie’s throat is tight and there’s a cold ache in his chest as he looks away again.

“Do you want to see him?”

He nods, silently.

* * *

Strange leaves him at the door of the morgue.

There’s a table with a sheet-draped figure in front of him.

He walks over and hesitantly reaches out, uncovers the face. Part of him doesn’t want to see Morse like this, but he needs to. That copper’s scepticism, he thinks; can’t be sure of a death until you’ve seen the body.

It’s pale and still, eyes closed. It’s not Morse, not in any way that really matters, but it’s all Robbie has, now, and even this not for long.

There are too many things he wants to say. That Morse was the best detective Robbie ever knew. That Morse helped him grow as a policeman more than Robbie could ever have imagined. That there’s nobody Robbie would rather discuss a case with. That for all his teasing, he enjoyed Morse’s musings on music and quotations and crosswords. That Morse was a grumpy, impatient old sod who drank too much and never bought his own bloody drinks and had both bad taste and bad timing with women and Robbie will miss him so, _so_ much that the thought of even one day without him makes an iron weight settle around his shoulders and stomach.

There’s too much to say.

Robbie bends, presses a kiss to Morse’s cold forehead, straightens.

“Goodbye, sir.”


End file.
